FEI WORLD DRESSAGE CHALLENGE FINAL RESULTS

Trinidad and Tobago Placed Second, by a mere 1.8 points in The World Dressage Challenge, which was held in the home ground of each competing country.

The Final Results:

Bermuda 1st  with 195.967, Trinidad and Tobago 2nd with 194.138, Cayman Islands 3rd with 192.432,  Barbados 4th with 190.720 and Jamaica 5th with 190.075 points.

BEST PLACED Trinidad Riders:

Margaret Auerbach riding Take Over - 1st  in Medium level;  Kyna Thompson riding Monte Carlo - 4th  in Preliminary Seniors, and Cammila Garcia riding Miramis - 4th in the Adult Elementary level.

CAMMILA GARCIA, 16 year old Trinidadian Equestrian Rider, won the "Most Elegant Rider" out of 136 junior and adult riders in Martinique on 26th & 27th February , 2011.

Martinique's Invitational event held each year at their Equestrian Centre, in Lamartin, hosts riders from France, French Guyana, Guadeloupe, Suriname, Trinidad and the home country of Martinique.  Riders are of all ages and this year included International French rider, Jean Marc Nicholas.

There are three levels of competition, the Grand Prix (1:10m to 1:20M) which had 33 riders, the Elite (95m to 1:05m) which had 43 riders and the Espoir level (.5 to .95m) which had over 60 riders.

Trinidad & Tobago was represented in the Elite level by the Super League Champion of 2010, Sandhya Moll (age 16 years), Cammila Garcia and Mariel Lanser (age 14 years) and in the Grand Prix by Steven Degheldere, who also acted as coach for the young riders.

On Friday 25th, the riders had the opportunity to practice on their horses which were loaned to them by the Martiniquian riders. 

Saturday 26th was the first day of competition and Trinidad's best result was a clear, not fast round by Sandhya Moll which placed her 8th in the field of 43 riders. Cammila Garcia had one rail down, Mariel Lanser had a clear round, but a bit too slow to be in the ribbons, and Steven Degheldre also had a rail down.

On Sunday 27th, Degheldere again had a rail down resulting in a 7th place finish of a field of 33 riders. The previous day, the horse that Moll was riding was withdrawn in the Grand Prix after a crashing through a couple of the jumps.  Moll did very well to get the horse to finish the course with only two rails down. Lanser also had two rails with her pony which was competing in only it's 2nd show at that level.

Garcia, however, had a clear round on her sensitive horse and got into the Jump Off (speed) round. Here she rode another clear round to finish 3rd out of 43 riders. An Excellent showing for a young rider in her second international competition.

Garcia was also voted "Most Elegant Rider", chosen from all the riders competing (total of approx. 136 riders), which included 3 riders from Centre Equestre de la Houssaye in Paris, France, all of whom rode in the Elite class and French international rider,  Jean Marc Nicholas.  Garcia was also part of the Trinidad & Tobago Dressage Team for the FEI World Dressage Challenge that came second in the Caribbean behind Bermuda, beating Cayman Islands, Barbados and Jamaica".

Degheldere was very proud of his young charges, stating that Mr. Nicholas, came to him and complemented him on the Trinidadian riders, stating that he was very impressed with the quality of their riding. This opinion was seconded by the Course Builder and Director of the Centre Equestre de la Houssaye, Mr. Michel Ismalin.